Well This is PalaceScorched, 10 years and going strong.
here's a little history on the fort.
I started a fort in the worse place I could find. Freezing.. No tree's No water plenty of monsters from yeti to blizzard men and lots of tundra wolves, Not one but two aquifers. So I figured I was pretty screwed from the get go.. but hell this is dwarf fortress whats life without a little challenge, First things first using the freezing method I busted though the two aquifers. It took a few tries, before I got a knack of it.. The yeti's enjoyed some crunchy dwarven popsicles in a few failed games.
dug through the ice and into the stone. Built a forbidden hatch and flooring over the stairs and aquifer hole. nothing up there but frozen death anyways.
Safe for now, still had the little issue of no water. ha no problem that's why aquifers are for right.. Channeled a hole plopped down a well. easy peezy. at least my dwarves wont' die of dehydration. Still didn't have the screw pumps to do any irrigation.. with the aquifer water, maybe later.. but I needed a more immediate solution, Didn't I hear on the forums that caverns had muddied land, what could go wrong ! It was either that or starve, Time to dig down, So I dug my way into the closest cavern, found an open area with a good amount of muddied land, broke in set down a farm.. and started walling off, It almost went off without a hitch.. till a troll ate one of my farmers, just before the walling off was done. I formed a militia and attacked the beast, lucky for me it was wounded and chased off. I managed to finish the wall and roof, food was secured,
after that it was smooth sailing 10 years later and this is my best fort yet. Massive tree farms and Magma Forges, Zoo's and a Dragon Pit, I am quite proud of what I managed to do with this frozen flat wasteland.
This is ground level, Gold roads up an down, Silver roads left to right. the walled off area is my refuse pile. (it's a 3 level structure)
This is my tree farm, I mined out the whole z level more wood then I can ever use, Two large production areas this is also my gate, and trade depot, interestingly I have never seen a goblin, either they can't get to me, because I am on an island.. or they freeze or the monsters get them, or they don't exist who knows, what ever is stopping them it sure doesn't stop the mega beasts from showing up.
Huge Farming area using screw pumps to irrigate the land, All farming has been halted as I am pretty sure I have produced enough food to last the next 10 years.
some production facilities fair amount of mining.
Zoo, Statue Garden, trainer area, you can also see the pit in this pic lower right, With dragon at the bottom.
Magma Forge about 7 or 8 levels down. Pumping up the magma from close to 100 levels down was a hell of a job. but having the forges way down there wasn't working for me.
I pumped it up 25 levels at time using nothing but dwarf power and storage tanks every 25 levels, here's one such tank about half empty, Using windmills wasn't practical as it dropped my fps and I would of had to setup enough to power 100+ pumps, and I lost a ton of power getting the power where I need it.
This is where honored dead go to rest.
Abandoned Cavern Farm, when I got my screw pumps online I moved the farming to above my aquifer.